Their little star

Melinda

“What happened now?”

Melinda asks as she answer the phone call, she had seen that it was Maria's number, but knowing how much Natasha and Clint have been spending time at her base, she can never she sure which one of them is calling from that number.

“Check your tablet.”

It was Maria’s voice, and the short, to the point comment makes her worry. Putting the plane on auto pilot, she reaches for her tablet, unlocking it she sees that the deputy director have sent her something.

“Should I be worried?”

“Well, it depends.”

An answer Melinda has never liked. Opening the files and seeing the pictures however, she understands why Maria have used the phrase. Quickly scrolling through the other information, she sees that Maria have given her everything she knows, which turns out to be very little.

“Thank you.”

“I will keep digging to see how this could have happened.”

Maria informs her before the line goes dead. Lowering her phone, Melinda takes in a deep breath. This would mean that one thing has been put to an end, now she just need to inform the others. Making sure they are keeping the right direction, she heads out of the cockpit, her direction in mind the command centre. But as she passes Coulson’s office, she stops and pushes the door open.

“Down stairs, now.”

She simply orders him before she keeps walking, hearing how he questions why, but a few seconds later she can hear him following her. As she reaches the room, she activates the intercom.

“Everyone to the command centre, now!”

She orders for a second time, and as she waits for the others to join them, she makes sure to connect the tablet to the holotable. One after another the members of 616 enters the small room, Jemma and Skye being the last two.

“I got some information. At 0800 hours, a S.H.I.E.L.D. team was sent to investigate a building from a tip off. This is what they found.”

She informs them, showing them the pictures of a dead Ian Quin.

“Just to be clear, he is dead… right?”

Fitz is the first one to ask the question and Melinda nods her head.

“According to the reports, he was already dead when they got there. No sing of any struggles in the building and his body has been taken in. We now wait for information about how he was killed.”

“Who sent this to you?”

“Hill thought it good for us to know. Seeing how we have been looking for him.”

“And now he’s all of a sudden dead.”

Ward makes the comment that had precented itself in her own mind when she spoke.

“Wait, we aren’t being blamed for his death, are we?”

 The worry in Jemma’s voice is clear and Melinda shakes her head.

“Even if they were to think in that direction, our flight data can prove we haven’t been anywhere near this location. We are fine.”

Coulson is the one to answer the question and Melinda nods her head.

“What I’m curious about is, who would have done this?”

“Well, he didn’t seem very popular with the Clairvoyant, or the other people he was working with. It could very much be one of them becoming tired of him and just decided that killing him was the best option.”

Skye speaks up for the first time and as Melinda turns to look at her, she can see that her attention is on the pictures, no emotion is being shown.

“Well, who ever it was, they have done us a favour.”

Fitz points out something that at least have gone through her mind and from the look in Jemma’s eyes, she is thinking the same thing. Hearing the sound of Shoot to thrill by ACDC suddenly playing, all of their attention is being turned towards to Skye who, with a deep sigh, pulls out her phone.

“What do you want Stark?”

She answer the call not even bothering to leave the room.

“What are you on about? No, I don’t trust you, I trust Pepper.”

A clear annoyance is clearly growing in her but as the anger is starting to show, it quickly disappears once more.

“How did you… Tony Stark you take me of speaker this very moment!”

And with this, she turns her back to the rest of us, but the fact that she still hasn’t left the room makes Melinda wonder why.

“Now, how did you even find out? Well, who told? Why am I not even surprised? This means that Pepper knows to? Good, that makes me feel better. I said it earlier, I trust her more than you! Love you too Pepper! Wait a minute, seeing as you are the that called, you are not the one behind? No, he’s dead, found earlier this morning. I can hear the smile, stop it! No I’m alright, in fact, I’m in the middle of a meeting… Yes, imagine that. Bye Tony, say hello to the others for me!”

Lowering her phone, ending the call, Melinda can see how she is taking in a deep breath, holing it for a few minutes before letting it out again. It takes a few more seconds before she turns around.

“Well, we can scratch the Avengers from the suspect list.”

She comments, putting away her phone.

“Why would they have been on it to begin with?”

“Really Ward?”

Jemma is the one that answer the question, one of her eyebrow risen before she turns to look at Skye once more.

“What was that about?”

“Well, once they learned that I had been shoot, they made sure to come and visit me, or well, Pepper was going to visit me, the others followed along. I made sure to never mention who shoot me because I was worried this would happen.”

She explains, pointing towards the screens that is still showing the dead man.

“But, Stark being Stark, he managed to learn the truth. About half an hour ago.”

She then adds, there is a far of look in her eyes, something that Melinda makes sure to ask about later on.

“At least one more group of the list then.”

Fitz comments and silence falls over them. Turning to look at the man that managed to create to much pain in a short amount of time. Having him dead was something good, the only thing she’s sad about is the fact that she wasn’t behind it.

“Since our target is dead, what do we do now?”

“We keep working on what we did before. Try and find this clairvoyant and put and end to his work and Centipede.”

And with that, Melinda let’s Coulson take over. She had shown them what they she had and she knows fully well that Coulson have been trying to work out a way to find the person behind it all.